An arbitrator has dismissed a grievance brought by the United Steelworkers against GreenFirst Forest Products’ Hearst Sawmill over the employer’s decision to assign weekend clean-up overtime to student employees rather than regular bargaining unit members.
The union had argued that the employer’s practice of assigning student employees to clean-up shifts, even when regular employees had volunteered, violated the collective agreement. It sought an order requiring the employer to offer the work to regular employees first, compensation for affected workers, and a ruling that students should receive overtime pay when working weekends.
The arbitrator rejected these arguments, ruling that the employer had discretion over overtime assignments since the collective agreement contained no specific provision restricting how such work was allocated.
Background and dispute
The dispute arose in June 2024, when the employer began assigning students to weekend clean-up shifts regardless of whether regular employees had volunteered. Previously, students were only assigned if there were insufficient regular employees signed up.
The employer maintained that the change was necessary to provide students with more hours and encourage them to remain with the company. The students, while included in the bargaining unit and required to pay union dues, did not accrue seniority and were historically paid straight-time wages for weekend work unless they exceeded 40 hours in a week.
The union argued that under the collective agreement, all weekend work should be paid at overtime rates and that the employer was required to offer the work to regular employees before assigning it to students. It further contended that if students were to be assigned weekend work, they should receive overtime pay.
Employer’s management rights
The arbitrator ruled that the employer’s decision to assign work to students was within its management rights. The collective agreement did not include language regulating how overtime work was distributed, and past practice alone was not sufficient to limit the employer’s discretion.
Referencing case law, the arbitrator noted that “clear collective agreement language is required to fetter an employer’s right to assign work.” Since no such restriction existed, the employer was free to assign clean-up shifts as it saw fit.
Additionally, the arbitrator found that the previous practice of prioritizing regular employees did not create an enforceable right. A past practice, the arbitrator explained, could only be used to resolve ambiguities in contract language, and no ambiguity was present in this case.
Student overtime compensation claim rejected
The arbitrator also dismissed the union’s attempt to expand the grievance to include a claim for overtime pay for students who worked weekends. The grievance, as originally filed, focused on the employer’s decision to assign work to students instead of regular employees. There was no indication that the union was advocating for higher pay for students at the outset of the grievance process.
“The whole focus of the grievance is the union’s claim that students should not have been assigned to the clean-up overtime when regular employees had expressed their willingness to perform this work by signing up for it,” the arbitrator stated. “The grievance is a protest against the assignment of the students to this work, with no hint at all of any concern about their possible under-payment.”
A brief email exchange between the union and employer on June 28, 2024, in which the union raised the issue of student overtime pay, was insufficient to expand the scope of the grievance, the arbitrator found. “The claim that students should be paid overtime for this work appears to be an after-thought to the grievance,” the ruling noted.
For more information, see GreenFirst Forest Products (QC) Inc. v United Steelworkers, Local 1-2010, 2025 CanLII 18577 (ON LA).
